The Soil Scorecard

For decades, agriculture’s greatest story has been one of rising yields, shrinking inputs, and triumphant productivity. Since 1948, total U.S. agricultural output has nearly tripled, even as labor use dropped by 76% and land by 28%. On paper, it’s a marvel of efficiency. But beneath that success lies a slow-motion collapse few financial models have captured: soil exhaustion, microbial impoverishment, and nutrient loss that quietly accumulate into what we might call soil debt.

This isn’t just an ecological concern. It’s a financial one. Because as fertilizer costs remain persistently elevated, weather volatility grows, and tariffs disrupt global supply chains, the unpriced subsidy of healthy soil is laid bare. And the systems meant to buffer against risk—insurance, lending, public incentives—remain priced for a model that no longer reflects the biological reality on the ground.

To remain viable, farmers will need something more than input subsidies and policy inertia. They’ll need a financial architecture that recognizes and rewards the repayment of soil debt—not just for yield, but for biological capital. That means scoring soil. Valuing biology. Pricing biodiversity. And creating instruments that connect what happens belowground to what gets financed above it.

Productivity’s Blind Spot

What we call productivity is often output divorced from context. Corn yields per acre may have quadrupled since the 1950s, but at what cost to soil structure, microbial life, and long-term nutrient density? Decades of monoculture, synthetic inputs, and deep tillage have steadily degraded soil organic matter and micronutrient content. Over half the world’s croplands now show signs of moderate to severe nutrient depletion.

In the U.S., these structural weaknesses were long obscured by cheap fertilizers, expansive subsidies, and insurance that rewarded acreage and yield targets, not ecological durability. But that model is breaking down. As of mid-2025, fertilizer prices remain elevated and volatile, driven by continued global supply disruptions and trade restrictions. U.S. tariffs on key imports have deepened domestic cost pressure. U.S. reliance on Canadian potash underscores how concentrated and vulnerable core nutrient supply chains have become. With every additional input dollar spent to extract one more marginal bushel, the illusion of cheap abundance begins to fade.

Brazil’s Microbial Advantage

While U.S. agriculture still leans heavily on synthetic inputs, Brazil took a different turn, not out of ideology, but necessity. Dependent on imports for 85% of its fertilizer needs and lacking equivalent crop insurance buffers, Brazilian farmers turned to biological alternatives at scale. As of 2025, over 156 million hectares (385 million acres) are managed with microbial inoculants, nitrogen-fixing agents, and biostimulants, making Brazil the world’s largest adopter of biological inputs in commercial agriculture. That domestic shift is now mirrored by rising international confidence across the region. Recently, the Gates Foundation backed Argentina-based Puna Bio, a startup developing extremophile microbes for use in degraded or high-stress soils, with eyes on expanding into Brazil’s vast tropical acreage.

This wasn’t a sustainability pivot. It was a survival strategy. Biologicals offered yield protection when fertilizers became unaffordable or unavailable. In doing so, Brazil, and increasingly its neighbors, leapfrogged into a model where soil function itself became a primary asset, rather than a disposable substrate.

That trajectory gained global recognition, when Brazilian soil scientist Mariangela Hungria received this year’s World Food Prize for her pioneering research on biological nitrogen fixation. Her work demonstrated that microbial inoculants could not only substitute synthetic nitrogen in tropical soils but also build long-term soil fertility and resilience. Her recognition, alongside rising capital flows into Latin American bio innovation, signals what many in the region have long understood: the microbial path isn’t a detour—it’s the road ahead.

Biology as Insurance

The global biologicals market is expected to more than double by 2030, growing from $17 billion to over $40 billion. It’s no longer fringe science. It’s fast becoming mainstream agribusiness. And with good reason.

Biologicals do more than substitute synthetic inputs. They:

• Enhance nutrient cycling via microbial activity
• Improve root uptake and water retention
• Promote soil aggregation and carbon buildup
• Suppress pathogens and disease pressure

In short, they de-risk the farming system biologically. That makes them insurance relevant. But the irony? Most insurance programs don’t yet recognize these practices as risk reducers.

When Insurance Ignores Biology

Today’s federal crop insurance system in the U.S. doesn’t reward regenerative practices, cover cropping, or microbial amendments. At best, it’s indifferent. At worst, it penalizes farmers who transition, locking in coverage based on backward-looking yield histories or refusing to underwrite diversified rotations.

But U.S. farmers aren’t ignoring soil health out of neglect. They’re responding rationally to a system that defines risk through a narrow lens: yield averages and historical loss patterns. The core metrics of insurability—actuarial zones, base yields, loss thresholds—offer no visibility into soil function, biodiversity, or long-term resilience. If the model rewards output without regard to ecological condition, behavior will follow the signal.

Some had hoped this would change. Iowa’s “Good Farmer Discount” experimented with premium relief for cover crop adoption. In 2022, USDA’s Partnerships for Climate-Smart Commodities launched a wave of pilot projects aimed at quantifying soil and climate benefits. But the program was cancelled in 2025 and replaced with Advancing Markets for Producers, a shift that moved away from soil metrics toward broader market access and value chain development. The signal is clear: regenerative finance is no longer the federal priority.

The Case for a Soil Scorecard

What would it mean to build a soil score? Start with what we already know:

• Soil organic matter levels predict water retention and yield stability
• Microbial diversity correlates with disease suppression and nutrient cycling
• Carbon content, infiltration rates, and root-zone biodiversity all influence long-term productivity

Yet despite this evidence, no standardized framework exists. Shared microbial metrics, common biodiversity scorecards, and actuarial models that embed soil biology into risk pricing remain largely absent. That’s the missing layer.

Now, imagine a scoring system that combines these known indicators into a single performance index, tailored to geography, crop type, and farm scale. That score could become:

• A discount factor on crop insurance premiums
• A qualifier for preferred loan terms from ag lenders
• A multiplier in voluntary carbon or biodiversity markets
• A screening tool for investment-readiness or ESG-linked financing

Crucially, the data doesn’t have to be perfect, it just needs to be directionally consistent, verifiable, and tied to outcomes over time.

A new class of startups is translating biology into balance sheets. Companies like Tierra Metrics, Inc. are building tools to quantify soil microbial activity, functional biodiversity, and other belowground indicators. Their goal: to make microbial health as measurable and financially legible, as yield or rainfall.

Closing the Incentive Gap

The upfront cost of transitioning to regenerative or biological-based practices is real. No-till drills, cover crop seed, fencing for rotational grazing, and microbial applications all require capital. Project Drawdown estimates an average cost of $355 per hectare to implement regenerative practices, but potential returns exceed $530 per hectare per year.

That gap is where finance should step in. Whether through:

• Public subsidies reallocated toward microbial-based performance
• Private insurers offering resilience-based premium models
• Biodiversity credit schemes that reward microbial health
• Blended finance vehicles de-risking the transition phase

Farmers shouldn’t have to choose between short-term survival and long-term stewardship. Soil finance should make the two compatible.

Making Microbial Metrics Bankable

Momentum is building for soil-centered biodiversity credits. Unlike carbon credits, which rely on sequestration estimates, biodiversity credits can recognize functional metrics: microbial richness, pollinator habitats, root-zone complexity. Groups like the Soil Health Institute, NatureFinance, and platforms such as The Landbanking Group are already experimenting with microbial and biodiversity scoring for credit generation.

What if farmers could earn biodiversity credits for maintaining specific levels of microbial biomass or fungal to bacterial ratios proven to reduce input needs and enhance system stability? These could plug into ESG reporting, supply chain compliance, or voluntary offset programs. Better yet, they could be bundled with insurance or loan terms to unlock upfront capital.

Soil is the System

Soil isn’t inert. It’s not a background. It is a living system, a biological infrastructure, and a risk-modulating asset. The failure to price that reality has left both farmers and financiers exposed.

Brazil is navigating this shift out of necessity—and in doing so, investing in the future of its agricultural system. U.S. agriculture could navigate it by design, but only if we redefine what it means to be productive. That means moving beyond short-term yield and recognizing resilience as a strategic asset. It requires investment in microbial metrics, biodiversity scores, and soil-function data that can inform lending, underwriting, and risk management. We need a new contract between land and capital, one that sees soil not as a sunk cost, but as a living system whose health can be tracked, quantified, and financed.

The question isn’t whether we can afford to build this system. It’s whether we can afford another decade of farming without it.

Roberta Leão, readverdant.substack.com